GreenTech

Tesla’s energy business is focused in part on solar power generation, but a big component of the business hopes to use its Powerpack commercial storage batteries in tandem with renewable power generation to store energy until it’s needed. A new proposal, reports Bloomberg, by energy supplier Deepwater Wind would use Tesla’s batteries in a new offshore

Storing the energy produced from renewable sources is a significant challenge, and one that a number of players, including Tesla, are looking to address. Add Alphabet’s X (formerly Google X) to the list of those making an attempt: Its new Malta project is focused on building storage facilities that can support full-scale power grids. The

Toyota is touting its progress on a new kind of battery technology, which uses a solid electrolyte instead of the conventional semi-liquid version used in today’s lithium-ion batteries. The car maker said that it’s near a breakthrough in production engineering that could help it put the new tech in production electric vehicles as early as

BMW Group today revealed more information about its forthcoming battery electric Mini car, which will join the existing internal combustion and hybrid options as a pillar of the lineup. The all-electric model will be a “variant of the brand’s core 3 door model,” BMW revealed for the first time today, and will enter production in

Tesla has added two new independent directors to its board, including 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch and Johnson Publishing Company CEO and Chairman Linda Johnson Rice. The two new board members were added just a few months after Tesla confirmed it was seeking additional independent directors without ties to CEO and founder Elon Musk.

It’s here: The first ever production Model 3 has rolled of Tesla’s assembly line, and into the possession of its owner – Elon Musk. The founder and CEO tweeted pictures of the new vehicle, which he only got because the actual first pre-order customer gifted Musk his place in the queue as a birthday present

Tesla will up its game in the renewable energy storage market with the largest lithium-ion battery storage facility in the world, to be built for Australia’s Hornsdale Wind Farm, with a completion date of December 1, 2017. The facility will use Tesla’s commercial battery storage Powerpack modules to deliver a capacity of 100 MW/129 MWh,

Just one day after we found out that Volvo intends to stop selling cars with exclusively internal combustion engine drivetrains by 2019, France’s minister of the environment Nicolas Hulot has detailed a plan to the Financial Times for the country that includes ending the sale of fossil fuel-powered cars by 2040. The effective ban will

BMW’s i3 high-capacity batteries, which it uses in its i3 compact electric vehicle, has applications beyond BMW’s own – case in point, the car maker is now supplying German boat propulsion system company Torqeedo with i3 batteries for its Deep Blue aquatic electric drive systems. The Torqeedo systems provide motorboats with hybrid and electric propulsion

Volvo is done with entirely traditional engines and exclusively gas-powered vehicles, the company announced. By 2019, Volvo group intends to offer only either fully electric or hybrid engines on all new models, making it the first automaker to commit to using only alternative drive trains. The end of the solely combustion engine-powered car did seem

Swedish tech startup Einride has built a full-scale prototype of its T-Pod, the electric autonomous transport vehicle it hopes will eventually replace smaller heavy-duty trucks, featuring remote control operation and a 200 kWh energy capacity with a maximum range of around 124 miles. The Einride T-Pod is unique in its design, as you can see,

Tesla has delivered 22,000 cars during the second quarter of 2017, the company revealed today. That includes 12,000 Model S vehicles and 10,000 Model X SUVs, adding up to a 53 percent increase over its delivery numbers for the same period in 2016. In total across Q1 and Q2 2017, Tesla delivered 47,100 cars, which

When you hear about companies raising tons of money for “smart glass,” the first thing that hits your mind might be something augmented reality-related like the HoloLens. But View, which just closed a $200 million funding round after securing $70 million from BlackRock alongside an earlier investment from TIAA, is using smart glass to make

Volvo tuner Polestar, which the carmaker acquired in 2015 to build its own race-ready Volve cars, is now being set up as its own separate company within the Volvo group, with a new focus on performance electric vehicles. The new Polestar will have its own branding, distinct from Volvo’s – though it’ll still produce performance

London could be a lot more green by 2050 – Mayor Sadiq Khan has outlined a plan for transportation service (via Engadget) in the city that would make the whole system, including taxis, cars and buses, totally emission free by that year. Even though that’s over 30 years away, it’s still an incredibly ambitious plan

Tesla’s next Gigafactory could be in China, according to a report from Bloomberg. The electric car maker is in talks to build its vehicles in the country for the first time, and it’s nearing and agreement with the city of Shanghai to construct the manufacturing facility in a nearby industrial development zone. The final details

Lyft has set itself some concrete goals for its renewed commitment to the Paris climate agreement, in spite of Trump’s announcement that the U.S. as a nation would be pulling out of the accord. Those goals focus primarily on Lyft’s autonomous ambitions, and so are contingent on the ride hailing company accomplishing its self-driving vision

London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan has announced a clean tech incubator aimed at sparking a new startup cluster in the UK capital focused on helping to foster the development of low-carbon and clean-tech products which are aimed at tackling the causes and effects of climate change. Among the issues the mayor wants London-based businesses to contribute ideas

Elon Musk couldn’t help but include some teasers in his Tesla shareholder meeting address on Tuesday, reiterating that the company would be holding a special event to reveal its Semi Truck at the end of September, but noting also that he would “really recommend showing up” for the event because “maybe there’s a little more

Henrik Fisker, who’s been teasing his new electric vehicle company after a stutter step first attempt with the original Fisker co. and the Karma, is back with the EMotion, the first car from Fisker Inc. The EMotion gets its first official eyes-on today via photos, not renders, that show us the vehicle in the aluminum and

Some 1.4 billion people lack access to electricity worldwide today, most in rural areas across Southeast Asia, China, India and Sub-Saharan Africa, according to data from the OECD. While others are focused on wiring up those places and developing new energy sources, a startup called Evaptainers has created a kind of refrigerator that requires no electricity, runs

Hemant Taneja Contributor More posts by this contributor: Pulling out of the Paris agreement on climate change will become one of the greatest economic blunders by a U.S. president in our lifetimes. People can disagree about the scientific premise behind climate change, but it’s an inescapable fact that the world is driving ahead to replace carbon energy with clean energy anyway.

Elon Musk is making good on his promise to leave President Trump’s White House advisory councils, he said today on Twitter. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO promised Wednesday he would step down from his official advisory roles with the administration should Trump go through with his plan to leave the Paris Climate Accord. Trump announced

High Times, the most prestigious brand in pot, has been valued at $70 million in a deal that sees it selling a 60% majority stake for roughly $42 million to investment firm Oreva Capital. Originally a marijuana enthusiasts magazine founded in 1974, High Times has blossomed into a set up web properties and the Cannabis Cup

If you’re about to replace your roof, Tesla has you covered, but roofs have a long life span, and besides, not all of us have the luxury/misery of having a roof to replace in the first place. Most of us have walls with glass in them, however, and that’s the window of opportunity SolarGaps is

The Tesla Model 3 is so close you could taste it (probably tastes like car) but we don’t yet know final specs on the vehicle. A new retail comparison chart surfaced at the Tesla Model 3 Owners Club forum (via InsideEVs) that offers some insight into what we can expect for specs, though it seems

Mercedes-Benz announced the price of its new electric 2017 Smart Fortwo: $23,800 for the hard-top coupe and $28,000 for the cabrio with a sliding canvas roof. The new coupe’s price is $1,200 less than the outgoing model, but the cabrio’s price is exactly the same. Besides the price, there are some practical improvements for the

Lyndon Rive, the CEO and co-founder of SolarCity prior to its acquisition by Tesla, will leave the automaker/energy company in June. Rive announced his departure on Monday in an interview with Reuters, saying he’s departing in order to spend more time with family and to spin up a new company sometime next year. Since the two companies

We’ve all seen the maps that show Florida being consumed by rising sea levels. But many of us still underestimate the impact of climate change because we can’t actually visualize its effects on the places we care about. In just a few hours at the TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2017 Hackathon, James Butler, Caitlin Squyres and Florian Carls put together

Where will self-driving cars go once they drop you off? In big cities, parking can be expensive and take forever to find. But TechCrunch Disrupt NY hackathon team Val.ai built a way for autonomous vehicles to participate in auctions for nearby parking spaces. When a self-driving car needs to park itself, it can submit real-time